DOD and CIA Records Detailing Meetings with bin Laden Raid Filmmakers
May 24th, 2012Via: Judicial Watch:
Judicial Watch, the organization that investigates and fights government corruption, announced today that it has obtained records from the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) regarding meetings and communications between government agencies and Kathryn Bigelow, Academy Award-winning director of The Hurt Locker, and screenwriter Mark Boal. According to the records, the Obama Defense Department granted Bigelow and Boal access to a “planner, Operator and Commander of SEAL Team Six,” which was responsible for the capture and killing of Osama bin Laden, to assist Bigelow prepare her upcoming feature film.
Related: ‘The Pentagon has a manual. Basically, it will only provide full cooperation to propaganda pieces.’
Facebook Banks Said to Make $100 Million on ‘Stabilizing’ Stock
May 24th, 2012*chortle*
Here’s one for your Invisible-Hand-with-Corporate-Logos file folder.
Via: Bloomberg:
Facebook Inc. (FB)’s underwriters for its initial public offering made gains of about $100 million through their work to stabilize the shares in public trading, said a person familiar with the matter.
Related: Facebook IPO
Disclosure: I’m Long Dell
May 24th, 2012Warning: This is not a recommendation to buy, sell or hold any financial instrument.
I bought some Dell (symbol: DELL) late in the session.
Arming Police Drones with Rubber Bullets and Tear Gas
May 23rd, 2012Via: CBS:
With the use of domestic drones increasing, concern has not just come up over privacy issues, but also over the potential use of lethal force by the unmanned aircraft.
Drones have been used overseas to target and kill high-level terror leaders and are also being used along the U.S.-Mexico border in the battle against illegal immigration. But now, these drones are starting to be used domestically at an increasing rate.
The Federal Aviation Administration has allowed several police departments to use drones across the U.S. They are controlled from a remote location and use infrared sensors and high-resolution cameras.
Chief Deputy Randy McDaniel of the Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office in Texas told The Daily that his department is considering using rubber bullets and tear gas on its drone.
“Those are things that law enforcement utilizes day in and day out and in certain situations it might be advantageous to have this type of system on the UAV (unmanned aerial vehicle),” McDaniel told The Daily.
New York Legislation Would Ban Anonymous Online Speech
May 23rd, 2012It’s time for some comedy.
Via: Wired:
Did you hear the one about the New York state lawmakers who forgot about the First Amendment in the name of combating cyberbullying and “baseless political attacks”?
Proposed legislation in both chambers would require New York-based websites, such as blogs and newspapers, to “remove any comments posted on his or her website by an anonymous poster unless such anonymous poster agrees to attach his or her name to the post.”
No votes on the measures have been taken. But unless the First Amendment is repealed, they stand no chance of surviving any constitutional scrutiny even if they were approved.
Republican Assemblyman Jim Conte said the legislation would cut down on “mean-spirited and baseless political attacks” and “turns the spotlight on cyberbullies by forcing them to reveal their identity.”
Had the internet been around in the late 1700s, perhaps the anonymously written Federalist Papers would have to be taken down unless Alexander Hamilton, James Madison and John Jay revealed themselves.
“This statute would essentially destroy the ability to speak anonymously online on sites in New York,” said Kevin Bankston, a staff attorney with the Center for Democracy and Technology. He added that the legislation provides a “heckler’s veto to anybody who disagrees with or doesn’t like what an anonymous poster said.”
Sen. Thomas O’Mara, a Republican who is also sponsoring the measure, said it would “help lend some accountability to the internet age.”
NSA Running College Programs for Cyber Operators
May 23rd, 2012Via: Reuters:
The National Security Agency is trying to expand U.S. cyber expertise needed for secret intelligence operations against adversaries on computer networks through a new cyber-ops program at selected universities.
The cyber-ops curriculum is geared to providing the basic education for jobs in intelligence, military and law enforcement that are so secret they will only be revealed to some students and faculty, who need to pass security clearance requirements, during special summer seminars offered by NSA.
DELL DOWN 17%
May 23rd, 2012Dell Inc. (DELL) 12.51 Down 2.57(17.04%) 10:49AM EDT
Splat.
Via: Reuters:
Shares of Dell Inc (DELL.O) fell 15 percent on Wednesday after a weak revenue forecast and disappointing quarterly results triggered stock price target cuts by a slew of brokerages on the world’s No. 3 personal computer maker.
Army Readies Its Mammoth Spy Blimp for First Flight
May 23rd, 2012Via: Wired:
Sure, it took an extra year or so, but Northrop Grumman has finally penciled in the first flight of the giant surveillance airship it’s building for the U.S. Army. The Long Endurance Multi-Intelligence Vehicle — a football-field-size, helium-filled robot blimp fitted with sensors and data-links — should take to the air over Lakehurst, New Jersey, the first or second week of June.
And Now… Software Will Allow a Single Professor to Deliver, ‘Meaningful Education to Hundreds of Thousands of Students at Once’
May 23rd, 2012In ten or twenty years, I wouldn’t be surprised to see the majority of paid work in companies, that is, work that isn’t done by machines, being done by these “certificate” holders. They’ll live in ever expanding slums, autonomously policed by RoboCops and drones. They’ll have fast Internet and there will be Superbowl commercials about how great all of it is.
—Top U.S. Colleges to Offer Free Classes Online
Via: Inside Higher Ed:
Without diminishing learning outcomes, automated teaching software can reduce the amount of time professors spend with students and could substantially reduce the cost of instruction, according to new research.
In experiments at six public universities, students assigned randomly to statistics courses that relied heavily on “machine-guided learning” software — with reduced face time with instructors — did just as well, in less time, as their counterparts in traditional, instructor-centric versions of the courses. This largely held true regardless of the race, gender, age, enrollment status and family background of the students.
The study comes at a time when “smart” teaching software is being increasingly included in conversations about redrawing the economics of higher education. Recent investments by high-profile universities in “massively open online courses,” or MOOCs, has elevated the notion that technology has reached a tipping point: with the right design, an online education platform, under the direction of a single professor, might be capable of delivering meaningful education to hundreds of thousands of students at once.
The new research from the nonprofit organization Ithaka was seeking to prove the viability of a less expansive application of “machine-guided learning” than the new MOOCs are attempting — though one that nevertheless could have real implications for the costs of higher education.
‘The Pentagon has a manual. Basically, it will only provide full cooperation to propaganda pieces.’
May 23rd, 2012Via: Vice:
…the past few years have seen an explosion of high-profile cooperation between the armed forces and the movie industry. If the most powerful armed force in history isn’t winning in reality, it certainly is on the big screen. And like so many problematic aspects of late capitalism, the military-Hollywood complex has a grimly understandable logic.
